Nintendo’s Risk Taker

"It is often said of Nintendo that their franchises are becoming stale due to repetition of certain aspects of the gameplay. The Zelda series has traditionally stuck to the same formula on consoles since A Link to the Past was released in 1992 (get 3 pendants, discover something, collect something else to defeat Ganon) and the Mario series has rarely deviated from saving the Princess from Bowser. Despite protests from certain corners of the gaming world, similarities between games isn’t always a bad thing; after all, a Mario game with no Bowser or Peach feels somewhat lacking and a Zelda game without the formulaic progression feels like a different series altogether. But despite the claims that Nintendo never change their series, there is one that they have always taken a gamble on, no matter how radical or how great a risk that gamble is. And that series celebrated 25 years of challenging preconceptions about itself last week. That series is of course, Metroid.", writes Nintendo-Okie.